Archive

My son and husband are watching a televised track meet being held in my hometown.

My mom used to take my siblings running along that track. We were all fast runners, something I thought we’d inherited from our dad until my mom’s cousin exclaimed how fast she always ran.

I was in middle school the one and only time I was chosen first for a team. My P.E. teacher explained my class would be running various durations for the next several weeks. She’d pool each team’s time for each run and tally them at the end. The team ending the challenge with the shortest total running time would get a school store credit.

Tim, a quiet boy I knew only as a skater, was named a team leader. He was told he could choose before other team leaders. He named me without skipping a beat.

I was shocked. A weirdo in weird clothes, I was always chosen last or close to it. It never occurred to me that a middle schooler might choose teammates based not on popularity but skill. Indeed, many adults haven’t mastered this! Read more…

Yesterday I cooked five dishes in one two-hour burst. This wasn’t my idea of fun, but a first practice run.

I go back to work in three weeks. I will be gone almost twelve hours daily, leaving me with just one waking hour each evening to spend with my kiddos.

I want to spend every minute of that with my kids.

Every. Single. One.

So, for now and once each week before returning, I’m building my cooking multitasking muscles by cooking many large dishes in one short burst.

Driving to preschool this morning, still aching at the thought of being separated from my kids so much, I interrupted my four-year-old’s Ninja Turtle drawing. “Soon we won’t have this much time together every morning, so I’m glad we have it now.”

Conversations with this neighbor had been friendly to date, so I smiled and said, “Nope. That’s not likely to happen. He saw a cricket on the door, and he’s convinced all bugs are out to get him!”

My neighbor ignored me, instead addressing my son again. “I told you to come here.” He held out his hand and said, “Come here and take my hand.”

Bemused by the weird turn of the conversation, I said, “No. I don’t believe in forcing kids to respond to adults, even close friends. It’s important training for them learning to trust their instincts.”